AMD Mantle

[blackened23]

Well, this thread is a breath of fresh air while the Video card mantle thread is full of idiots arguing - mainly non-objective hardcore nvidia fans talking smack. I use nvidia now (GTX 780) but I think this is a pretty great move by AMD to differentiate their brand just as nvidia has done for years with physx, TXAA, and the like. Fairy ballsy move by AMD like this to differentiate their product - whereas their prior 6970 and 7970 were status quo products with no features to differentiate them. Finally AMD has learned how to differentiate their brand to create value, this is EXACTLY what nvidia excelled at with their nvidia-only features.

Anyway, back to the topic: I would be more interested in UE3. IS cryengine 3 even being used in anything other than Crytek games? What will be using it?

I do think Frostbite 3 having Mantle will be a net benefit - many games are being developed with it including Dragon Age: Inquisition and the next-generation Star Wars game. Starting in December, Frostbite 3 will have Mantle baked in from the get-go so the other titles will have it available as well. If UE3 gets Mantle, that could have a lot of implications in terms of titles that will be available using it, UE3 is very popular as a multi platform engine.

But I am curious as to whether CryEngine 3 will become a massively popular multiplatform engine. I don't recall the prior cryengine's being used that much aside from crytek games.

 

[Grooveriding]

Well, this thread is a breath of fresh air while the Video card mantle thread is full of idiots arguing - mainly non-objective hardcore nvidia fans talking smack. I use nvidia now (GTX 780) but I think this is a pretty great move by AMD to differentiate their brand just as nvidia has done for years with physx, TXAA, and the like. I think it's great that AMD made a ballsy move like this to differentiate their product - whereas their prior 6970 and 7970 were status quo products with no features to differentiate them. Kudos to AMD for that.

Anyway, back to the topic: I would be more interested in UE3. IS cryengine 3 even being used in anything other than Crytek games? What will be using it?

I do think Frostbite 3 having Mantle will be a net benefit - many games are being developers with it including Dragon Age: Inquisition and the next-generation Star Wars game. Starting in December, Frostbite 3 will have Mantle baked in from the get-go so the other titles will have it available as well. If UE3 gets Mantle, that could have a lot of implications in terms of titles that will be available using it, UE3 is very popular as a multi platform engine.

Chris Roberts' new Star Citizen game is using CE3 and he gave a demo at the AMD presentation. No mention of Mantle there, but I expect it is possible as AMD is Crytek/EA's partner on Crysis.

 

[Nintendesert]

Well, if Nvidia is to be believed, Direct X performance isn't really that bogged down for gaming. The direct to metal path isn't such an improvement as it was in years past because of DX efficiency.

That announcement was made shortly before this Mantle release, so take that as you will though. Really though, pushing 4k is going to take a lot more raw power (even SLI Titans struggle to get very low framerates from the tests I've seen), so a small (even 30%) increase in efficiency isn't going to do much to change that.

Realistically, I think this is AMD trying to leverage their inferior (as in lower raw graphics power) against much more expensive graphics cards. This could work out, depending how robust the tools to use this API are and how easy it is to use it. Paying for a weaker card and getting the same performance in Mantle games as a much more expensive card could garner them more marketshare.

I now believe that interview wasn't a counter to SteamOS at all and their push for OpenGL, but instead an attempt to counter the AMD Mantle announcement. I'm not sure how believable that interview is anymore, it does fly in the face of what other game developers have stated.

If the Anandtech article works out and this is AMD leveraging the XBone API this will be huge for crossplatform titles and not add much more work for most developers as just about everything ends up on the consoles as well so the work using a similar if not exact Mantle API is already being done.

 

[Stringjam]

I would really like to hear from Crytech and see if they are going to incorporate Mantle.

I don't think they're ruling it out:

We are always talking to our technology partners to see where working together makes sense. If that will include Mantle in the future- who knows.

As closely as they seem to be working with AMD lately, I wouldn't be surprised to see it.

 

[imaheadcase]

In the end Mantle is just another tool devs can use, it does not equal better performance I would argue, just something they can use if needed. It remains to be seen if Mantle is just a hype train or what.

The whole amd demo did not feel exciting though, I think many people were offput by them focusing on sound part of demo, that was a waste of time to put that into a card. Everything they demoed about sound can already be done with min effort by CPUs.

 

[Aikouka]

Well, this thread is a breath of fresh air while the Video card mantle thread is full of idiots arguing - mainly non-objective hardcore nvidia fans talking smack.

Heh, that reminds me of how worthless it is to go to Mobile Devices & Gadgets for anything Apple related. You can tell that objectivity is out the window from the get-go when a negatively-slanted Apple thread title is prefaced with "LOL".

The whole amd demo did not feel exciting though, I think many people were offput by them focusing on sound part of demo, that was a waste of time to put that into a card. Everything they demoed about sound can already be done with min effort by CPUs.

Honestly, the AMD presentation was downright awful. I'm sure the people at the presentation didn't mind it since they were being liquored up, but to actually sit there with incredibly dry presenters reading off prompters. I turned it off halfway through the first (out of three) audio presentations! Honestly, I have no problem with trying to make strides in positional audio, but you need some wow factor in your presentation. Why do you think Epic always makes those nifty-looking demo renders, which highlight all the new changes?

Also, I think you're going to have a really hard time convincing most gamers that they really need to worry about their audio system -- especially since most of them probably don't even have good audio setups on their PCs!

What about Intel derivative GPU solutions? Such as in a mobile solution I have adapted. Sorry, but if it does not work across the board, it can't really that too exciting in my mind.

AMD stated that it's possible for any architecture to use Mantle as it supports HLSL (High Level Shader Language). The problem is that that someone (i.e. Intel) has to adapt it. As someone that has systems built around Intel's iGPU, my only comment is: don't hold your breath. Intel has done nothing but disappoint me with the terrible nature of their iGPU drivers and they've actually driven me to the point where I am looking to alternate solutions for powering my HTPCs in the future.

To give you an idea, I have two full-fledged HTPCs. One of them is gaming-oriented and has a GeForce GTX 660Ti on it. I have no problem setting it up. The only issue I have with it is that for some reason, HDCP is flaky (WMC complains) unless I open the NVIDIA Control Panel to the HDCP tab. It's weird. However, my other HTPC uses an i3-3225 (HD4000), and I can't even enable any sort of overscan correction. There's an option, but if I attempt to adjust it, nothing happens and it resets to 100%. I would rather pay $60 for a passive NVIDIA solution than use Intel's drivers (AMD's drivers still have issues with Splashtop Remote Desktop).

 

[Imaginer]

So AMD is remaking what Direct X is from the ground up and bypassing some OS protocol (security and all)?

I still am not sure in the industry taking the re-invention of the wheel and setting yet another standard, based on programmer's political view with OS, language, and letting that blind them against using and improving what is further ahead. And what works right now overall hardware and software wise.

Because, if I fully re-invest gaming computing to Mantle, it means just that. A possible new video card and driver song and dance issues I had years past. But it would be worse due to other computing companies 'not playing nice' in the field.

 

[gorobei]

So AMD is remaking what Direct X is from the ground up and bypassing some OS protocol (security and all)?

I still am not sure in the industry taking the re-invention of the wheel and setting yet another standard, based on programmer's political view with OS, language, and letting that blind them against using and improving what is further ahead. And what works right now overall hardware and software wise.

Because, if I fully re-invest gaming computing to Mantle, it means just that. A possible new video card and driver song and dance issues I had years past. But it would be worse due to other computing companies 'not playing nice' in the field.

umm no. nice baby and the bathwater.

mantle will likely only replace d3D graphic calls in the code. the devs will go on using directx directaudio and directinput like they always have.

 

[Aikouka]

So AMD is remaking what Direct X is from the ground up and bypassing some OS protocol (security and all)?

My low-level knowledge isn't deep enough to answer this question with absolute certainty, but I'm pretty certain the answer is no. You cannot magically bypass the HAL (Hardware Abstract Layer) in Windows. All video cards need drivers in Windows, and it's my guess that this is simply an API that talks to the drivers directly. Although, I wonder how that interacts with the WDDM.

 

[desprado]

Battlefield 4 and Frostbite 3 Will Support Both AMD Mantle and NVIDIA NVAPI
http://wccftech.com/battlefield-4-fr...optimizations/

 

[Aikouka]

Battlefield 4 and Frostbite 3 Will Support Both AMD Mantle and NVIDIA NVAPI
http://wccftech.com/battlefield-4-fr...optimizations/

I think the interesting part of that is that I've never even heard of NVAPI.

 

[0___________0]

My low-level knowledge isn't deep enough to answer this question with absolute certainty, but I'm pretty certain the answer is no. You cannot magically bypass the HAL (Hardware Abstract Layer) in Windows. All video cards need drivers in Windows, and it's my guess that this is simply an API that talks to the drivers directly. Although, I wonder how that interacts with the WDDM.

Kernel drivers can communicate directly with hardware without having to use the HAL's API. Even the graphics API's of the PS4 and XB1 have drivers that they use to access the hardware. That's why there's no real usage of literal "coding to the metal" anymore. This is a tangent; anyways, AMD doesn't need an abstraction layer right now, but what happens when they release GCN 2.0, 3, 4? Then, without an abstraction layer nothing is going to work. So they probably have their own abstraction layer. This is always going to be a weakness in PC's, the hardware is not static, which necessitates the HAL.

 

[BrightCandle]

Mantle is either abstract enough to support future GCN's as well as Nvidia and Intel graphics and hence isn't really bare metal, or it doesn't support future GCN and comes not only with fragmentation of API but also stagnation in the GPU market.

Seeing as how along with this AMD also announced a new sound API I don't see now as the time to choose to fix on a particular list of features of GPUs and based on the diagrams I think its just an alternative model to DX + drivers and isn't really all that bare metal at all. I reserve full judgement on its impact until the API is released and I can write something against it to see what using it is like and also see the spec for the driver interface.

 

[KentState]

I would almost expect that Mantle will reside in the driver layer itself, by-passing D3D. Since the drivers are hardware specific, they can add GCN features without worrying about handling NV or Intel's implementation.

 

[futurefields]

Mantle is either abstract enough to support future GCN's as well as Nvidia and Intel graphics

It is for AMD GCN GPU's only. Nvidia and Intel graphics can not use Mantle.